User Reviews

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75

Game Boy AdvanceGame Vortex

Dogz doesn’t really push the envelope in the arena of digital pets. While nothing in the game really stands out, it doesn’t do anything really badly either. Dogz is ultimately a good, if somewhat typical and mediocre, digital pet game.

Bear in mind, this is aimed at very young children, so it might make a nice present. Now, I have to end this review before I start sounding like some snarky film critic bagging on the dialogue and plot development in Dora the Explorer.

This is beautiful game for the younger audiences. Not too much interactivity for anyone older than a third grader. If you love Nintendogs, don’t take the large step backwards to this game. It is just simply not worth it if you are accustomed to the extra interactivity possible on the DS.

There are plenty of other small complaints waiting to be leveled at the game, from its obvious rush to market judging from the translation (the pet store you visit at the start of the game features a sign that was never translated from its original Japanese, and if you take the time to do so personally, you realize it simply says "pet store"); the in-game character proclaims Sunday is his favorite day, when clearly Sunday's the worst day of the week; or the fact that this editor was forced to mangle his first name in order to make it fit into the game's character slot. Though this review's overwhelmingly negative, these comparisons come mostly thanks to the existence of Nintendogs; in the absence of an option for picking up Nintendo's effort, Dogz is a less compelling but worthwhile riff on the same idea ideal for younger gamers. Your sibling will be content just so long as they don't catch you playing Nintendogs.

Dogz begins with three simple questions that imply that you will find a dog to fit your personality, but after entering the answers you’re taken to a pet shop filled with dogs that don’t quite match up to what you specified. It doesn’t really matter anyway because every dog in the game seems to behave in the exact same way. What’s the point of the questions? I don’t know. I’m still trying to figure out the point in actually playing the game. It may be easy to pass this off as a game for young kids. After all, they can watch the same videos over and over again without ever growing tired of them. But when it comes down to it, don’t your kids deserve better? Do you want to teach them to be a button-pushing automaton or to give them something that will challenge their developing minds?

All in all, Dogz isn't just a poor man's Nintendogs - it's a fundamentally rubbish game, regardless of the competition. Put simply, there's just not enough to do, and it's so repetitive that it's hard to see how even very young children could be entertained for more than half an hour or so. A game this shallow and lazily designed deserves nothing more than to be slung in a bag full of bricks and chucked in the river. Avoid.